Earlier this week following a meeting of our Board of Directors, I exited our headquarters building down the back stairs.
As I walked to my car, I noticed a blanket spread out on a patch of grass beneath a small shrub near the edge of the parking lot. Stretched out on the blanket was an old man. He appeared to be asleep, even though it was at least an hour before dark arrived and settled in.
I approached him to say hello and to make sure he was okay. As I did, I startled him.
He attempted to jump up, and he seemed to be trying to brace himself for something very unpleasant.
“No, no,” I began. “Keep your seat! I just wanted to say ‘hello’ and meet you!” I tried to reassure him.
He relaxed, smiled and shook my extended hand.
“They let me stay out back here. I’m sort of a night watchman,” he informed me, not knowing that I worked at CDM.
“I see,” I nodded.
“Sure wish I could get my hands on some peanut butter and maybe some bread,” he said. I guessed he was waking up and had decided that I had emerged from the building where he knew we operated a large food pantry.
“I can take care of that for you, I think,” I replied to his simple request.
I returned to the building and gathered a bag of food and drink for him. When I returned, he was sound asleep again. I placed the bag by his blanket and didn’t disturb him further.
As I drove away, he roused up again, discovered the bag of food and waved to me. I drove closer and visited with him about a housing solution. We’re still working on that.
What I cannot remove from my mind is the image of his face when I first approached his little bed. The fear on his face—I’ll always remember it. I know that look must be a learned response, an automatic reaction formed from his many experiences with people like me.
An old, very thin, very poor, very hungry man. . .scared to death of the likes of me.
So many people, it seems, are afraid of the poor.
What we never consider is just how afraid the poor are of those of us who are anything but poor.
The fear of the poor arises from what they suffer at the hands of people who live in the richest nation in the world.
A fear born of being ignored,
shunned,
rejected,
ridiculed,
analyzed,
debated,
embarrassed,
kicked out,
denied,
arrested,
abused,
stereotyped,
scorned,
judged,
imprisoned,
beaten,
and forgotten.
Experience had taught my new friend to be afraid of, of. . .me.
Lots of people fear the poor.
Realizing that people like me are, in fact, the fear of the poor ought to reframe our understanding and change the way we behave.
I remember reading somewhere that “perfect love drives out fear.”
God, have mercy. God, help us.
10 comments:
Thanks Larry.
Amazing insight, thank you for this one.
As our church seeks to be more of a friend and neighbor to the increasingly poor population around us, we will undoubtedly have certain questions arise:
"What if people steal from us?"
"What if they destroy our facility?"
"What if people abuse our gifts to them?"
"What if we enable them?"
The point that these questions (and countless others like them) miss, is that we aren't just trying to blanket the poor with our provision - we're trying to befriend them and come along side them.
But you just gave me a question to respond with.
"What if we're too afraid of the poor to minister to them?"
Joe, I think these questions are important and valid. Among the so-called 'chronically homeless' population, there is considerable mental illness, and there are also gangs which prey on homeless people.
However, I have been in many situations with people who are homeless over the years and felt safe. One Thanksgiving night about three years ago I was with a group of six women feeding from the HungerBusters mobile soup kitchen truck, under a bridge at I-45 and Martin Luther King Blvd. at the homeless encampment. It was dark, and we parked there for a couple of hours and were out walking around talking to people with no problems whatsoever. I have also been at this camp many times with my daughter, Rose, taking clothing to people. I have never felt threatened there, though the camp is gone now, razed by the city.
I've only felt unsafe one time in this part of town where many of the homeless stay, and it was also at night feeding people in a parking lot. We had had many customers, and, at the end, a man approached us. I was working 'on the ground,' kind of crowd control in front of the catering van. I reached out to touch him in greeting, and he shied away, looking very angry and even threatening. Some people do not like to be touched, and I should not have assumed he did. I immediately backed off, did not make any more eye contact, did not speak any more and let him be -- I believe he was psychotic and not on medication. So you just have to use good judgment and be aware.
Theft, etc., can be issues with any group of people -- there are always 'stinkers' in any group, in any part of society. Abuse of gifts will sometimes happen in any walk of life also. Why do we often think this is a reason not to help people? We all abuse God's gifts all the time, don't we? Yet He keeps on giving them. This is not our 'area' of responsibility, in my view, because we can't control what people do with what we give them -- it is really about our compassion and doing what we believe is the right thing to do. Most people will use what we offer in a reasonable way in order to survive.
Enabling is not an issue either, as far as I’m concerned, and I know this is controversial. Phil Romano, restauranteur and HungerBusters founder, once said of this issue, "I'm only trying to keep [homeless] people alive by feeding them." It's really that simple, and that urgent. People can’t get their lives together if they can’t survive. If we do nothing because it might be enabling, we indeed do nothing. The enabling argument can be a reason not to act, but there are certainly people of good conscience and action on behalf of homelessness and poverty who legitimately disagree with me.
We may be either romanticizing or demonizing people living in homelessness and poverty if we think there will be no negative issues in dealing with them. And I think we’re always nervous when first ‘out of our element’ -- I certainly have often been. But it’s so worth getting past that, as you clearly know.
Larry’s post today is so right on. When you speak kindly to a person living on the street, they are usually absolutely shocked, so unaccustomed are they to compassionate treatment. Their faces will light up in amazement. They are good, loving people, for the most part, grateful for help -- just like the rest of us.
I think Ms. Shafer strikes right to the heart of the matter. Because we are all human, all of us are both made in the image of God and afflicted by original sin.
Some of us, by means of our character, our opportunities or just by chance, do a little better than others. Essentially, however, there is very little difference between all human beings. The very worst of men or women only reveal a part of us that all of us share in and wish did not exist. The very best of humankind only hint at what we could be if we could fully realize what we have all been given.
The people that live on the street, some of whom visit me regularly, and the people that give us millions of dollars, some of whom I also visit with regularly, are not very different in their essence as human beings.
I believe all wisdom begins in humility and that we are all sorely lacking in that characteristic. When you connect with other human beings, then you start to realize how close we all are together.
Finally, I want to say just a word about the man Larry met the other night. Coming out of the office just a littler earlier than Larry, I also saw him and he greeted me by name. He looked very comfortable, sitting in the shade on the east side of a small tree while the sun set in the west--it was another brutally hot day here in Dallas.
I didn't remember this man. Not unusual for me. I meet so many persons. Some I've represented as a lawyer. Others I've tried to help find housing. I am not very good at names. But I greeted him and asked how he was doing. He told me fine, and I walked on.
He didn't tell me he was hungry or needed anything, and I didn't ask. I think I was friendly and respectful, but I still failed him. I didn't give him the help he needed and that was in my power to give.
I'm glad he met someone more sensitive to his needs that night. Tomorrow, perhaps, I will do better.
Thanks to all for the conversation here.
Serious summer, good thoughts, as always. One correction: I was not more sensitve at all. The man just ask me for something to eat. I did what I know you would have done as well.
What a surprising story. What are concrete ways that we can address this? How do we keep ourselves from being perceived as a threat?
The poor deal with an enormous amount of chronic fear which is often hidden or disguised.
You are exactly right that people are afraid of the poor. Most people don't have a clue...and they don't want to know. They fear poverty as if it were contagious. They fear that their own knowledge of the issues of the poor will make them accountable to act. They fear that connecting to the poor will make the poor "real" and more difficult to blame or shame.
Fear is a definite divider.
As human beings, we must be concerned about the needy.
The poor can be tough, so it's best to approach cautiously and bring them food and drink and maybe find out beforehand where they might get help, although most homeless know all the soup kitchens and shelters and stuff.
Taking care of the hungry, the thirsty, the homeless, and the imprisoned is a solemn duty of Christians, as a group and also as individuals.
Never, NEVER give the poor money, as this would go for alcohol, tobacco, or drugs. They cannot help themselves, so we must.
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